Brian: Saturday, 3-29-08
New York Times 38:03 (shame level [for using help]: zero; it’s a Saturday, for crying out loud)
New York Times
by Mike Nothnagel, edited by Will Shortz
Why even bother to pretend I solved it in 38 minutes? No way. I solved it with help in 38 minutes. But no Google this time. Instead, I went to the glory of XWord Info, and when I felt mildly secure about an answer, I put it into the clue search to see if it had been used on March 29, 2008. I avoided looking at the final grid (for fear of seeing squares I hadn’t yet filled), but thought that this clue search thing would be a good way to check my work.
I got the top half of the grid fairly quickly, for the most part. Right away, I had 15A. Linebacker Brian banned from the 1987 Orange Bowl for steroid use (BOSWORTH), although I deleted it almost as fast when I thought that 9D. In ___ (briefly) was SHORT instead of A WORD. But once 11D, 12D and 13D (GRANDE, ATTEST and SHEETS) fell into place, I returnMr. Bosworth to his proper place, and managed to complete that area. Idiot level = low, and cheating level = non-existent (so far).
The top left was also fairly smooth sailing for me, and required no cheating (but much guessing). The first three down clues came easily: PACE CARS (1D), STATE LAW (2D) and HARD TIME (3D). At this point, I made my first guess on 34A. Very worried: SWEAT THE SMALL… Nope, that didn’t fit. SWEAT SMALL… Nope, that won’t work either. I wanted it to be SWEAT-something, but didn’t have much of an — WAIT! I’ve got it. And without any other crossings except the first three letters, I blazed forth with a bold and daring move, one that definitely left me very worried: SWEATING BULLETS
This proved to be a good move, and it opened up a lot of options in the lower right. Between having the start letters to the three big down clues at 36D, 37D and 38D, I also made some bold choices at the bottom there with 57A. Affix, in a way (ADHERE and ATTACH were my downfalls yesterday; I tried GLUE TO first, and later revised it to GLUE ON); with 60A. Amusement park vehicle (I really wanted it to be TEA CUP for some reason [I have pictured the Mad Hatter's Ride at left], and even tried SAUCER before wondering why I had ridden in a GO-KART as a child); and 62A. Tuner’s place (STEREO, which just didn’t seem the right match for me — I think of a “tuner” as either one who writes tunes, or [because I've read Variety too much, a musical], and “stereo” isn’t where either of those things reside).
By this point, I was able to complete the middle of the grid (15D. Cinematic captain of Star Command had me stumped for way too long because I was thinking Star Trek and not Toy Story [the answer is BUZZ LIGHTYEAR]; this is an inexcusable mistake in that my wife and I just completed a Pixar marathon last weekend, watching all of them [except Ratatouille, which we had both seen multiple times recently] on Ryan’s huge television), and was pleased that a number of my initial instincts were correct: WHIZ KID (23A), GLAM (28A — Sweet’s Brian Connolly pictured at right), BREYER’S (48A) among others.
Now maybe it was because I read Linda G.’s comment on my Friday post that gave me a mental block. More likely, it was that my idiot factor was kicking into high gear. I had some big problems with the lower left. Although I nailed 61A. Children’s Bargain Town, today (TOYS ‘R US), that was about it. I incorrectly went with CRUSADER for 59A. Caped combatant, which gave me enough correct letters (three, as it turned out) to believe it was the right answer. The U then led me to assume that 43D. Fighting words? ended with either GUY or BUY. And 51A. Point and click, e.g. made me think twice — ah, are they going after computer terminology, or perhaps camera terminology? I thought that thinking twice would be the smart choice, and that while computer terms seemed sensible, this was a Saturday — camera terms were more obscure. Clever me, I thought. I have since learned that thinking twice is one time too few, as a third time around would have led me to the more correct, more roundabout, and thus more Saturday-esque answer, VERBS. So it was after staring at this section for a while (”a while” = many minutes) that I checked CRUSADER with the XWord clue database to discover it was wrong. Out came the errant U. In went ARE TOO (42D) and BEES (52D). In went CAVETT (41D). Finally in went TOREADOR, in went ET CETERA (55A), and the rest of the grid fell into place.
All in all, I feel like I accomplished something. I’d love to be able to do a Saturday without any help, but that’s just not a reality. So until it is (maybe by 2038), I’ll settle for false times and the feeling that I am at least smarter than my cat. (HINT: My cat has been chasing her own shadow lately.)
I’m working on designing another crossword. My mother solved the first one, and apparently liked it. This next one is going to be very tricky at first, but once you break through it, everything will fall into place.
